10
UNIVERSITY COURIER.
tion given here is too liberal. The temptation for the Normal graduate to build even a broader foundation by afterwards completing the collegiate course, is, we must confess, a temption which the truly ambitious find it hard to resist. And if we consider the Normal merely a machine for grinding out teachers for the country schools, then, most assuredly, the University Normal is a failure.
It is impossible for a young man or woman who acquires a liberal education, and has any ambition at all, to be satisfied with a life work in the common or district school, at a salary which does not average $300 a year. If it is the policy of the State to make teachers who are, permanently, to remain in the common schools, then the sooner Normal students are removed from the temptations of a thorough education the better. The fact of their being on the same footing with the collegiates here, so far as the two courses coincide, reciting in the classes, being under the same carefully selected professors, gives the Normals opportunities which no other school in the State can offer; and perhaps this very advantage defeats the ends sought.
Were a young man to spend three years in going over and over, and over again the rudiments of the lower brenahes, he, no doubt, could teach the three R's. much more glibly than the graduate who has spent the past three years mastering the principles which underlie a true system of education.
If we are to make no progress at all, if we are to remain forever in the same place, then the State should be careful to see that her teachers are not educated to such a point that they will not stay in the ranks, if the profession cannot afford to pay what like labor demands. The idea of a man holding the highest rank as an instructor, not being able to command a salary of more than a thousand dollars a year, and even then subject to removal through the whims of those who are not competent to judge of his capabilities, is preposterous. Not a lawyer, physician, merchant, tradesman of any kind but would scout such an offer.
The refusal of the Legislature to place diplomas here on a footing with those of Emporia can be of little consequence to our graduates. The diplomas now are State certificates for five years; and the graduate who, within five years after his life work has begun, has not risen to a higher position than teacher in our country schools, or cities of third class (the schools in which the Emporia diplomas are life certificates) deserves no favors.
While to Emporia the refusal to grant life certificates here will be beneficial in directing to her halls many who are just ambitious enough to wield the rod over some country school, and who are satisfied with a salary of three hundred dollars—and constant removals.
The common schools will also reap a benefit, because many tempted with the offer of a life certificate will enable Emporia to turn out more teachers who will be satisfied to remain longer in the ranks, or else unable to get out.
But after all wouldn't it be a broader and better policy for the State to encourage education in all directions, and in all ways? Can not the two schools be put on such planes as to derive benefit from each other? If the Emporia Normal take for her work the training of teachers for our common schools, let the State stand by her. But we need other teachers also, and where
better should their training be than at the State University? Might not the course here be lengthened from three to six years, and as the name implies let the University graduate graduates? The University Normal should be put upon a higher plane, for of all professions or callings that of the teacher should be the most comprehensive, and most sacredly guarded by the people.
SCIENTIFIC NOTES.
It is said that man makes use of only three hundred species of plants out of the one hundred and forty thousand known to him. This statement needs verifying.
The Carson Footprints are still a subject of lively discussion among scientific men. Professor Marsh thinks that they are the tracks of a gigantic species of sloth. Prof. Cope, Dr. Harkness and others who have studied the tracks say that it cannot be definitely determined from the tracks alone whether they belong to a species of the genus homo or not. If fossil remains are found the question relating to our apeish ancestors may be more definitely settled.
Prof. H. Cohn, of Breslau, believes that the use of slates by school children tends to produce short-sightedness, and would substitute either pen and ink, or an artificial white slate with black pencil manufactured in Pilson, and already introduced into a few German schools.
TROGODERMA TARSALE AS A MUSEUM PEST.—Prof. F. H. Snow publishes, in Psyche, descriptions of the larva and pupa of this beetle. The Professor thinks that this species only troubles collections in the West and South, inasmuch as Dr. Hagen did not include it in his lists of insect pests of New England and the Northern States. An observer at Washington, speaking of the insect in the American Naturalist, says that it is the most dangerous enemy to insect collections in that vicinity, and is more frequent than Anthrenus Varius.
DERMESTIDS.—A common appellation given to insect pests whose larvae feed upon collections, are a source of injury to all collectors. Notwithstanding the fact that the University cabinets have been made as tight as possible, the doors and cases closing with tongue and groove structure, yet these dermestids, or as the students sometimes call them, "infestes," find their way to the specimens. After they get into a collection if undisturbed, they would totally destroy it in two or three years. It is necessary therefore to "watch them out," and this is a constant care, a thing which must be attended to by those who wish to preserve their collections. How to get them out when once in is a question which involves some difficulties. One way is to place the infested specimens in a tight box or can and kill the pests with the fumes of cyanide of potassium and sulphuric acid. This plan does not work well with pinned insects as the fumes corrode the pins. In most cases the larvae can be shaken out of pinned insects by holding the head of the pin between the thumb and finger and springing the point so as to give the specimen a slight snap. Benzine is sometimes used with success, but insects moistened with benzine become very brittle when dry and break easily. It would seem from the above that it would be almost impossible to keep a col-